Re: Updating definition of "bogus" groups?

[Eric Abrahamsen <eric@ericabrahamsen.net>]

Russ Allbery <eagle@eyrie.org> writes:

> Emanuel Berg <incal@dataswamp.org> writes:
>> Russ Allbery wrote:
>
>>> I've never been clear on what this function does that I would want to
>>> do and why it's bound to a key. I've only run it when I pressed b by
>>> mistake, and it's never done anything. I may just be not using the part
>>> of Gnus where it would be useful?
>
>> The docstring says "Remove bogus newsgroups." which, granted, sounds
>> pretty useful.
>
> Historically on Usenet that means newsgroups that were deleted, so I
> assume that's what it was intended to mean.
>
>> But then I wonder, how do they enter the *Group* buffer in the first
>> place?
>
> Well, if it's just groups that were deleted, one either was subscribed to
> them or for whatever reason had them listed and unsubscribed.
>
> In other news readers historically, it was common to keep a newsrc that
> included every group on the server whether one was subscribed or not.  In
> that context, checking for bogus groups was looking for groups that you
> have listed in your newsrc (possibly unsubscribed) that no longer exist.
>
> I guess Gnus could have the same problem?  It definitely doesn't with my
> settings, but I know there are a bunch of settings.

What you mentioned about disappeared groups -- that they show up with a
* for the article count -- is connected to how the bogus check works
now: it's all around whether a group can be activated or not. You get a
* when a group can't be activated, or Gnus otherwise can't figure out
the group's article numbers. And the bogus check is also just asking if
the group is active or not.

So I guess what I'm imagining doesn't have much to do with bogosity,
after all. It starts with the servers, not the groups, and asks for an
explicit group list. So maybe it's just something that can live
alongside the bogus check, instead of insisting on replacing it.